Session 1 Summary

The Raid

We join our heroes inside their home within Lucan, the city of magic. It is an old apartment building that is literally falling apart. The heroes know each other from living nearby on the ground floor. On this particular night, however, the heroes heard some pounding on the front door of the complex. They ignored it and pounding grew louder. Annoyed, Hale Doomwarden yelled "Shut up!" while Qirk Kek looked outside through his window. He saw police in front of the door, equipped for a raid. The heroes had heard about police raids before, and knew that they were not friendly, even to complicent citizens.
Qirk began to climb out of his window to try and escape the building, but a spotlight moved directly onto him and he shut the blinds. The police smashed down the front door and began entering the apartments. Bertis heard screaming from the room right next to him and decided it was time to go. He quickly snuck through the hall to the stairwell, avoiding detection. Meanwhile, Hale utilized a crumbling hole in his ceiling to get up to the second floor. Qirk considered using his shapeshifting ability to turn into an old man and play dead, but decided it was a bad idea and attempted to follow Bertis.
Unfortunately, the old wooden door to his room creaked loudly and a nearby police raider saw him, shouting "Stop!". Qirk did not comply and instead opened a few doors in the hall as he ran for the stairwell. Another occupant escaped one of the rooms and headed upstairs. Meanwhile, Hale ran up to the stairwell on the second floor, but found the metal door to be locked. He attempted to break the lock, but had some trouble. While Hale struggled with the door, Qirk began to search the rooms for occupants and anything else he could scrounge up.

Bertis discovered an old man in one of the rooms who motioned for him to enter. Hearing the sounds of the police smashing doors open from below and footsteps on the stairs hastened Bertis's decision and he followed the man. The strange man had stacked up some old furniture to get through another hole in the ceiling and said "Hurry! Through here!" The heroes gathered the other occupants climbed through the hole. After Qirk pulled the only child up through the hole, Hale covered the hole with a matress and some junk laying around. The heroes were now on the third floor, which was in a terrible state of disrepair. Bertis heard some movement behind a door and told the occupant to get out. The man turned out to be a shady-looking individual who acted quickly, shouting "Everyone on the roof! Now!"
Everyone followed except for Qirk, who continued searching rooms for more junk. He found some money and some illegal substances, and attempted to run to the roof stairs, but a police raider had smashed through the covered hole with his powered battering ram. As Qirk ran past, he took a swing with his beatstick and delivered a nasty shock to the shapeshifter. However, Qirk made it upstairs and everyone looked expectantly at the shady guy. The old man soberly stated, "So we're on the roof. Now what?"

The shady man responded, "Easy. We go down the fire escape and lose them in the streets. I know the way." Reluctantly, everyone followed him.

The Streets of Lucan

Surprisingly, the shady individual managed to bring everyone to (relative) safety in the streets. He claimed that the police would not follow them and would instead finish raiding the apartments. Most of the civilians departed at this point and only Qirk, Hale, Bertis, the old man, and the shady guy remained. The shady guy vaguely mentioned a safe place some distance away and, with few other options, the others followed. While walking through the streets, the old man introduced himself as Arctus. He told the heroes that he had been living in Lucan his entire life and that it hadn't always been an industrial giant.
In the old days, it had been like any other town, with taverns, shops, and adventurers. However, since Tulstor came into power within the government, he had advanced Lucan to its current state.

Bertis quickly grew tired of Arctus's old man-reminiscing and voiced his annoyance: "Ugh. Enough with the stories."

The shady man also agreed and Arctus said "Fine." and turned to Hale. "What's your story, then?"

Hale mentioned that he was trained as a smith in the traditional ways: "I forge real weapons."

Arctus raised an eyebrow and said, "Ah, a traditionalist? I can respect that."

However, the shady man scoffed at this and remarked, "A factory can turn out 100 swords in the time it takes you to make one."

Annoyed but still confident, Hale quipped "Yeah, and they'll all be broken 100 times faster than the sword I forged."

At this point, the shady man stopped for a second and looked around. Arctus noticed: "You... know where we're going, right?"

The shady man angrily shot back, "Yes, I know exactly where we are! I just don't remember these streets."

At this point, Hale began to look around and noticed some graffiti on a nearby building. Having been in the streets before, Hale recognized it as a gang tag, specifically, "The Knives". Just then, a man walked up and accosted the heroes:.

"What do we have here?" The scumbag went on, "You're passing through our territory. You gotta pay the toll."

Remembering the coins he had found in the apartment, Qirk answered, "Yeah? How much?"

The punk responded, "Whatever you got on you."

Hale, fed up with the bantering, threatened, "Look. Leave us alone and we'll let you live."

The gang member laughed and said, "You're threatening me? You have four people and an old man." He then whistled and several more gang members piled out of some nearby buildings.

Hale, ever confident, scoffed, "That's it?"

This angered the ringleader and he whistled again, signaling a fight. The gang converged on the heroes, attempting to overwhelm them with numbers. Bertis eagerly waited for them to bunch up - this was his specialty. Meanwhile Qirk, furious with the ringleader, engaged with the intent of humiliating him.
Hale began stabbing the thugs with his spear, slowly but steadily taking them down. Bertis unleashed a few of his spells, blasting groups of thugs with fire. Unfortunately, some hounds attacked from the side, leaping onto Arctus and forcing him onto his back. Wounded, the ringleader realized he was going to die. He called out for more gang members to join the fight and another group responded. Qirk had had it with the ringleader and shapeshifted into a devil, absolutely terrifying him. Looming over the cowering ringleader, Qirk ended his life.

The Flood

Unfortunately, the heroes had taken some injuries and there seemed to be a legion of gang members approaching.
The shady guy yelled, "There are too many! Run!" Bertis set the doorway to the nearby building on fire, slowing the flow of thugs. The heroes attempted to retreat, but Qirk took a hit while running and fell to the ground. The heroes looked back, and the shady man yelled, "Forget him! We need to keep moving!" Arctus hesitated, and then muttered, "I swore I'd never do this again." He swung out at a thug and used some magic to revive Qirk, who smugly remarked, "I knew it." Finishing the last nearby thug, Hale turned to the approaching mass and and challenged "Who's next?" Bertis set the corpse on fire and the gang was momentarily stopped.
However, more gang members poured in from the side alleys, and the heroes climbed over a chain-link fence, though Bertis struggled with the task. Fleeing, the shady man noticed a side door to an abandoned building and picked the lock. Hoping to lose the gang, the heroes entered the building, which turned out to be a bar. Hale grabbed some alcohol and poured it all over the door, and Bertis set the door on fire. Hale also managed to grab a bottle and throw it into his pack. The shady guy picked the lock on the opposite door and the party headed back into the streets. Gang members had surrounded the building and closed in. The heroes, desperate, ran into another alley stuffed with garbage.
Then something strange happened - the garbage shifted. The heroes continued to climb through it, and it moved some more. Then, it took the form of a huge trash golem and attacked! Another gang ringleader, seeing the monstrosity, shouted "Cheese it!" and the gang bolted. Weary from the previous fight, the heroes could not believe their ill fortune. The trash golem let out a terrible stench, smelling like rotting Indian food. It then began thrashing around, attacking furiously. However, the heroes focused all their attacks on the thing and the shady guy leapt onto its back, stabbing like a madman. The golem was obliterated and the heroes stumbled out of the alley and out of gang territory.

A New Home

After recovering for a few minutes Arctus demanded, "What was that back there!?"

The shady man replied, "Let's just keep moving."

"You almost got us killed back there!"

"Shut up! I know where we're going now."

"Unbelievable."

Silently, the heroes reached an abandoned warehouse. The shady man said, "Here we are. This is the safehouse. It's only got two doors to secure and the windows are small and high up. We can rest up here."

Hale, incredulous, stated "We just went through gang territory and fought a trash monster for this?"

Arctus joined in: "So what now? We've found ourselves a wonderful new home, but the police will find us eventually."

After some silence, Bertis asked Arctus, "So what did you do back there?"

Arctus replied shortly, "I don't want to talk about it."

"Why not?"

"Because I said I would never do it that again."

"Why did you say that?"

Arctus, exasperated, said, "Because that kind of magic is illegal."

Qirk jumped in: "This is the city of magic, and you can't cast your magic?"

Arctus replied, "My magic is not like the magic that you see around you. This conversation is over. I've already said too much."

Bertis then remembered Qirk's shapeshifting trick during the fight and asked him about it: "So what about you then? You turned into some kind of devil thing back there."

Qirk lied, "I have a trinket that only I can use. It lets me shapeshift."

Bertis sneered, "A trinket. Right. Can I see it?"

Qirk hurriedly replied, "No, it only works on me."

"I just want to see it."

"No."

Some more silence passed as the heroes rested and reflected on their current situation. Eventually, Arctus said, "Times sure have changed."

Bertis saw more old man-talk approaching and said, "Here we go."

The shady guy chimed in "Seriously."

Arctus continued, "No, I'm serious. The city is in a terrible state, and it's getting worse."

The shady individual said, "There's only one thing left to do. It's time for a revolution."

Arctus chuckled and said, "Oh, really? And how do you plan to do that?"

"Sneak into the upper level and assassinate Tulstor."

Arctus thought for a second and said, "That will never work. But your idea of a revolution just might be exactly what we need."

Hale agreed, "I was about to say that myself."

The shady man said, "So then where do we start?"

Arctus thought replied as matter of fact, "We can't do anything without a base. We need to fortify this warehouse. And for that, we are going to need an accumulator."

Hale, being a traditionalist, sniffed, "I don't see why we'd ever need one of those things."

Arctus said, "It's only for powering this place."

The shady man said, "I know a guy who knows a guy that might be able to get us one."

Qirk checked him: "The last time we followed you, you took us through gang territory."

The shady man angrily replied "Fine! Find one yourselves." and sulked in a corner.

The heroes must now make an important decision: how does one start a revolution?